


blueberry sin

by pvmpkin



Category: TOMORROW X TOGETHER | TXT (Korea Band)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst and Tragedy, Blood, Blood and Injury, Comfort/Angst, Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Heavy Angst, Hurt No Comfort, Light Angst, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Stabbing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:54:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28391232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pvmpkin/pseuds/pvmpkin
Summary: Soobin, arriving too late for his usual bus, meets a new boy who he has to sit next to on the next bus. He finds that this mysterious boy intrigues him, and every day from then, they take the same bus and sit beside eachother.He never realises how much he begins to look forward to the boy’s arrivals each day on the bus, until one day the boy doesn’t show up, and Soobin gets an ominous text from him tagged with a location.What will Soobin do?
Relationships: Choi Soobin & Huening Kai, Choi Soobin/Huening Kai
Kudos: 6





	1. prologue

**Author's Note:**

> My intentions are not wrongly placed and I mean no harm through this writing. I do not intend to romanticise, belittle or undermine the seriousness of any of the sensitive topics that will appear.
> 
> The prologue (chapter 1) will give you a rough idea of the worst of what would appear. If it in any way upsets you, I must insist that you do not read this. I don’t want to hurt anyone.

_Seven months ago-_

_Pain coursed through his body, causing his back to arch and a small whimpering noise came from his mouth. He wanted to scream but his voice wouldn’t work. He couldn’t move at all, and the pain wouldn’t go away. His body was sticky with sweat but he was shivering._

_Something hot and metallic tasting was trickling from his mouth, and he was shaking. There was a stabbing pain in his chest and he couldn’t lift his head to find the reason for it. He had been fine, walking alone in an alleyway, when someone approached him and said something to him. He had opened his mouth to answer and they had pulled something out of their pocket and suddenly everything was a mess of pain and blood. They had run away immediately, leaving him to collapse to the ground._

_What was it - a knife, a gun? He didn’t know but god, did it hurt. He knew he shouldn’t have been walking around at night by himself, but hell, how was he supposed to know this was going to happen?_

_His vision was starting to blur and darken, and his breathing was beginning to slow. He made one last attempt to open his mouth and shout for help, but nothing came out._

_He was alone as he was dragged into unconsciousness._


	2. the boy on the bus

“Excuse me.. sorry. Just need to.. get.. past..”

Choi Soobin’s voice is a little strangled as he gently pushes people aside, trying to get past without seeming rude. He just wants to get to his lecture before it starts; he knows how impatient his professor is. And having the streets crowded this early in the day doesn’t help.

He supposes, it can’t be helped. It’s a popular place in the city but it’s not usually this busy. Maybe it’s because Soobin is running late and doesn’t usually come here this late in the day, but his alarm had failed to wake him up, he had forgotten to choose an outfit the night before and had consequently taken 10 minutes to choose an outfit, and lastly, to top it off, he had missed his bus and had had to wait half an hour for the next one. His temper, to put it lightly, is at its very end.

Oh, fuck _politeness._ When have any of these people ever been polite to _him?_

He starts shoving people out of his way. He sees that the bus is arriving, parking at the bus stop, and he pushes through the last of the crowd of people. There are many people in the streets but there was a particular alleyway that people stayed well away from. The walls and floor were stained with long-dried blood from a stabbing that had taken place months ago. No one knew who had gotten stabbed, but everyone knew it was someone young, and that it was a bad stabbing; apparently, they nearly died. Not quite, though. Still alive.

He’s pulled away from his thoughts when he arrives at the bus. He smiles at the driver and hands over his money. The driver smiles back.

“You’re lucky. There’s only one seat left, and you’re just in time for it. Seat C7, at the back.”

Soobin bows to him hastily and makes his way to the seat. It’s a double seat, and the seat by the window is taken. He sits down heavily in the empty seat, putting his bag between his legs and drawing the seatbelt over his hips.

He’s not used to sharing a seat, usually he arrives quick enough to have a seat to himself, but not today. He tries not to look at the person next to him - he’s not great at meeting new people, and he has no wish to talk to people he doesn’t already know, and yet he finds himself glancing at the person beside him.

A boy? A year or so younger, by the looks of it. Pretty, but he looks sad. He has his forehead resting against the window, his soft brown hair falling over his eyes.

The boy suddenly turns his head and catches Soobin unawares. Soobin finds the tips of his ears heating up, a soft pink spreading across his cheeks.

“Oh, I’m sorry..” he splutters.

To his surprise the boy only smiles at him, a small curve of his thin lips.

“Don’t worry about it.” He has a soft, melodic voice.

Soobin hesitates, wanting to speak. The boy’s head tilts ever so slightly in anticipation. Soobin finds it hard to think properly - this boy really is very beautiful. He has a strong gaze and an elegant facial structure.

“You look.. sad. May I ask why?” Soobin asks, trying to sound confident.

The boy shakes his head and smiles again, this time strained. Soobin worries that he’s touched a nerve.

“I don’t like this place,” the boy says, his gaze travelling out of the window and fixating on something. Soobin tries to follow his gaze but the bus lurches forward and finally starts driving.

“That’s why I don’t come here. But the bus route I used to take has been cancelled permanently, and it’s rerouted here. So I don’t really have a choice.”

“Why don’t you like it here?” Soobin instantly regrets asking it.

The boy looks at him and meets his eye. His face is impossible to read.

“You don’t want to know.”

Soobin tries to work out what he had meant, but he can’t think straight. He’s not great at working out problems, especially not on the spot.

“Do you always take this bus route?” The boy asks.

“Yes. Although, I’m late today. I missed the last bus, the bus I usually take. Luckily this bus takes the same route, but I’m probably going to be, like, half an hour late to class.”

“You go to university?”

“You don’t?”

Another shake of the boy’s head. “No.”

Soobin is now completely perplexed. This boy, he decides, is far too mysterious. Impossible to read and every sentence seems to leave a question mark in Soobin’s mind.

“Why is that?” Soobin asks tentatively.

“I can’t.”

“You.. can’t? Why?”

“Curiosity killed the cat.” Is the terse response. Soobin opens his mouth to respond and closes it again. God, this boy confuses him.

“What’s your name?” Another question from the boy. Question after question and still not one clear answer from the boy himself.

“Why?”

“You say ‘why’ a lot.” The boy laughs a little. “If we’re going to take the same bus route every day and we’re going to see eachother every day, we may as well know eachother.”

“But.. I usually take the bus before this one.”

The boy rolls his eyes slightly. “I can take that bus instead. I’ve got nowhere pressing to go.”

“Oh.. well, my name is Soobin.”

The boy nods, thinking for a second. “Mine’s Kamal.”

Soobin’s eyebrows raise. “Cool name. Unusual.”

Kamal shrugs a little. “You could say that.” He turns his head to look at him again. “Tell me about your university. Is it good?”

Soobin’s a little taken aback by the question. “Oh.. yes. It is. The people are nice, the professors.. well, they could be better, but they could be worse. I’ve made a lot of friends there.”

Kamal half-smiles. “That’s good. I’m glad you like it there.”

“Yeah, but I probably won’t when the professor sets me extra work as punishment for being so late. Unless I take the route through some alleyways to get there quicker, but-”

“I recommend you don’t.”

Upon seeing the questioning look on Soobin’s face, he goes on, “Alleyways are dangerous.”

“Are you talking about the night in the bloody alleyway?” Again, Soobin tries to read Kamal’s face but it’s completely unreadable. It’s like trying to read a book in a different language.

“Not specifically, but that’s a good example.”

“That night was a one off. It’s never happened again. And the victim was never found out. They’ve kept it a damn good secret - I don’t know how no one’s found out yet. Feel kinda sorry for them, although they shouldn’t have been walking around at night by themself. Everyone knows you don’t walk around by yourself.”

“Are you saying it was their fault?”

“No. No, God no.” Soobin’s offended that this boy would even consider that. “Of course not. Knife crime is never anyone’s fault but the person behind the knife’s.”

Kamal nods. “How much do you know about that night?”

“Weird question.”

The boy shrugs. “I don’t know much about it myself. No one does, I don’t think. Do you?”

“Um.. no. Not really. People suspect it was a failed mugging, but I don’t think so.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know.. it just doesn’t seem right. I mean.. if someone wanted to mug a person, and they refused, you wouldn’t immediately stab them, would you? You’d press them more until they let up. And the police said it seemed rushed and messy, by the force and angle. But it wasn’t the kind of stab wound that would guarantee death. Surely if a mugging went wrong, you would kill them properly to hide evidence? So no one would know it’s you.”

“I suppose so.” Kamal taps his chin. His dark eyes glance at Soobin. “You seem to have done a lot of research into it.”

“It’s interesting.” Seeing Kamal’s eyebrow twitch upwards skeptically, Soobin hurries on, “Not in that way. It’s just.. no crime ever happens around here. For something like that to happen.. it’s insane. Unheard of.”

“It’s a city. Things like that always happen in cities.”

“Not this city.” An incredulous tone creeps into Soobin’s voice. “You really don’t come here much, do you?”

“I try not to.”

Soobin nods, deciding not to ask any further. He knows it would be insensitive.

Kamal chews on the corner of his nail, and asks, “Do you dye your hair often?”

Soobin is thrown by the drastic change in conversation, but tries to go with it. “Not too often. Once every month or so, it stays blue for a long time.”

Kamal nods and smiles, looking out of the window at the world blurring by. “It looks good. You look like a blueberry.”

“A _blueberry?_ ” Soobin lets out a snort, making Kamal start laughing. This time it’s a proper laugh, and Soobin feels his heart pace increase. Kamal has such a pretty heart shaped smile, and his eyes crinkle and sparkle. He’s beautiful, and his laugh is loud, contagious. He looks almost relieved, like he hasn’t laughed in years.

“Yes, a little. A few shades darker and all you’ll need is a leaf on your head to top off the look.”

“Well, thanks for the advice - I’ll try it next time I dye my hair!”

“Good, good.” Kamal seems to think for a second, then says, “Do you think I’d suit dyed hair?”

Soobin runs his eyes over Kamal’s face, taking the opportunity to soak in his beauty and appreciate it as much as he can, the little scattering of freckles, the thin eyebrows, the long eyelashes, before speaking.

“Yes, I think you would.”

“What colour?”

“Maybe... maybe a light colour. Like blond, or maybe a pinkish red. Both, maybe.”

“What, so I can be a strawberry?”

Soobin grins, letting out a rather loud squeaky laugh and then covering his mouth immediately afterwards. He’s never laughed like that before.

Kamal simply smiles widely, whispering the word “Cute.”

Soobin feels his face heat up, and he hates that he can’t help it. He wishes he was more confident, less prone to blushing at the slightest thing, but unfortunately he can’t change that. Kamal seems to like it though. His eyes sparkle as he regards the flustered Soobin.

The bus shudders violently as it suddenly comes to a halt, finally at their destination. Startled by the sudden lack of movement, Soobin’s first instinct is to grab onto whatever’s closest, and he ends up grabbing his bag with one hand, Kamal’s arm with the other. He quickly lets go once he realises what he’s done, blushing even harder, but had held on long enough for Kamal to look at him strangely.

“Sorry,” he blurts.

Kamal shakes his head. “You apologise too much, Soobin.”

“Oh. Sorry- I- oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to keep- I should probably go, this is my stop.” The words tumble out of his mouth with no real control from him, and he stands up too quickly. His head bumps against the roof of the bus, drawing a little yelp from him - it’s a pretty small bus, and he’s one tall boy. Kamal stands up too, more cautiously, and looks at Soobin with concern.

“Are you okay?”

Soobin nods quickly, wishing he was more careful. He’s surprised to see that Kai is almost the same height as him, just a little bit shorter. Kamal reaches out, brushing aside Soobin’s hair and checking for bumps. Soobin is beside himself, completely frozen at the boy’s gentle touch.

“It’s a little red. You’ll need to be careful.”

Soobin nods again, gushing a short thank you, and Kamal waves a hand, brushing aside his thank you and implying that he wants Soobin to walk out of the bus. Soobin quickly picks up his belongings and walks down the middle aisle of the bus, trying to walk quickly so as not to hold anyone up. He thanks the driver with a little bow and steps off of the bus. He internally sighs - there’s still a ten minute walk to his university.

Kamal steps out of the bus, walking over to him. He reaches out and lightly places a hand on Soobin’s shoulder for a ghost of a second, making Soobin’s face heat up once again. Kamal smiles at him, says “I’ll see you tomorrow,” and starts walking away in the opposite direction that Soobin was going to go. Soobin notices how Kamal walks slightly _off_ \- he doesn’t know how to describe it, but something isn’t quite normal. He finds himself watching Kamal as he goes, his gaze lingering until he turns a corner and is gone from his sight.

A hand comes down on Soobin’s shoulder and he turns his head to see his closest friend, Beomgyu, standing by his side with a broad smirk painted onto his face.

“Oh, Choi Soobin, you gay little mess.”


End file.
